Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic

Here is the info for patching Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic with the WS and HUD patches, so that the game will run properly in widescreen. Note that you should perform the steps described in both the WS Resolutions and HUD Correction sections.

Patching

Special Instructions for Steam Version

Unfortunately, because the Steam version executable is encrypted, UniWS can not be used to modify the Steam version of the game directly. However, UniWS will work on a no-CD (cracked) executable of the original disc version of the game. This executable can in turn be used with the Steam version's content files to play the Steam version in widescreen.

Please be aware that using a cracked exe could be seen as a violation of Steam's Subscriber Agreement, and you accept full responsibility for whatever resulting consequences, if any. In practice however, Steam has generally allowed us to discuss the mod openly on their forums and there are other precedents where they've allowed (or knowingly overlooked) the use of alternate executables for modding purposes.

We can not provide direct links to the no-CD executable, but search on "Kotor no-CD" in the search engine of your choice and you should find it quickly.

The no-CD version you need is the v1.03 fixed EXE by FairLight.

Unzip the no-CD executable and replace the executable in the game's install directory (typically C:\Program Files\Steam\steamapps\common\swkotor\).

(Optional) After running UniWS described in the section below, you may wish to rename the edited executable so that it is not overwritten during Steam content verification, but you'll need to manually create a shortcut to it then, as it will not launch from the Steam Games menu.

Widescreen Resolutions

The game plays in Hor+ widescreen with the use of the UniWS patcher, originally developed by Wogg. The Patcher consists of two parts: Uniws.exe (which is the GUI interface and patcher), and the patches.ini file (which contains the game data to make the patch).

We strongly suggest making a backup copy of the KotOR executable (swkotor.exe) and placing it somewhere safe before modifying the game.

Download UniWS here: UniWS.zip. Unzip to a directory of your choice and run.

Choose "Star Wars: KOTOR (1024x768 interface)" from the Game dropdown menu, regardless of what resolution you want to patch to.

Locate the game's folder in the folder browser.

Enter your chosen widescreen resolution and click the Patch button. Note that widescreen resolutions lower than 1440x900 will not work! If you need to patch to a resolution lower than 1440x900 see the Notes below.

If the Patch button or resolution boxes are greyed out, you have either not selected the appropriate directory, or your version of the game is not compatible with UniWS. UniWS only supports the v1.03 retail disc or no-CD versions of KotOR.

The new resolution should now be available in the game's options menu. However, some people have reported the resolution does not show up. For this reason, we recommend setting the resolution in the ini file before starting the game. Open swkotor.ini found in the game's main installation directory and edit the "Height=" and "Width=" settings to match the resolution you specified in UniWS.

If the UniWS patcher does not work for some reason, please see the detailed explanation on how to edit the HEX in this forum thread.

HUD Correction

Sweetz (old username: Stevedroid), with the help of Malakaius (who originally discovered the HUD files could be edited), has created adjusted HUD files for all working common widescreen resolutions as well as corrected 2D backgrounds for the menus. Many thanks to both of them, without whom this would not be possible.

Download the appropriate file for your selected resolution from the below links.

Unzip the files into the "Override" directory found under your main KOTOR installation directory.

Troubleshooting

First, please review the instructions carefully, making sure you didn't miss a step. We've found that 9 times out 10 when someone reports trouble getting the mod to work correctly, they made a small mistake or skipped a step.

If you experience an issue where you can not move the mouse cursor all the way to the right edge of the screen, enable Hardware Mouse in the game's options.

If pre-rendered movies aren't playing correctly:

By default, KotOR is hardcoded to play pre-rendered movies at 800x600 regardless of game resolution. UniWS alters this so that movies will play at the same resolution the game is patched to, this fixes movie playback on some systems where it did not work. However, some people have indicated that while movies played fine in the pre-modded game, they do not display correctly after modding. As a possible solution, UniWS's patches.ini can be altered so that it will not modify the movie resolution.

First undo any previous patching using UniWS (you don't need to touch the HUD files, just run UniWS), or use your backup copy of the executable.

Save the file and repeat the WS Resolutions steps using the updated patches.ini

Notes

If KOTOR is run at standard widescreen resolutions below 1440x900 it will either crash, or dialog text will be missing (preventing the player from responding to conversations and rendering the game unplayable). For users of 720p HDTVs or 1360x768 displays, I suggest setting up a custom resolution of 1530x864 (the closest resolution that runs ok) and using video card scaling to downscale this to your native resolution. You would then patch KOTOR to use 1530x864 based on the instructions above, not 1360x768. Files have been provided for this resolution. For 1280x800 users, the same solution of setting up a custom resolution and downscaling will work; 1440x900 would be an appropriate choice in that case. Setting up custom resolutions can be a troublesome process and varies from driver to driver, ask around on video card enthusiast forums (Guru3D, Beyond3D, Rage3D, NVNews, etc.) for instructions on how to create custom resolutions with your video card if you do not know how to do this.

The highest resolution KOTOR normally supports is 1600x1200. Therefore, 1600x1200 was highest resolution available for the 2D background art. My (Sweetz's) fixed 2D backgrounds are merely resized/recentered versions of the original source art. For resolutions with a width greater than 1600, I simply filled in the extra space with black because I'm not the greatest with Photoshop. The menu backgrounds are simple TGA image files, so if you do have some art skills, you may be able to fill in the blank space with something a bit better looking. Please share them (contact Sweetz through the forums) if you do.